The Other Shoe
by CriminalOutsider'sGirl14
Summary: Soda always knew the other shoe would eventually drop, Darry and Ponyboy were just too different. He just didn't know it would end up like this. (Rewrite of my story Better Left Unspoken) One-shot.


**The Other Shoe**

 **Summary:** _Soda always knew the other should would eventually drop, Darry and Ponyboy were just too different. He just didn't know it would end up like this. (Rewrite of my story Better Left Unspoken) One-shot._

 **Disclaimer: No, I don't own The Outsiders, sadly. S.E. Hinton, however, does.**

 **Third Person POV ~Fall,1969~**

Sodapop always knew that one day, the other shoe would drop.

Even after both of his brothers proclaimed in the park that night that they wouldn't fight anymore, Sodapop knew that they would. They were just too different not to.

What he didn't know was that when the other shoe dropped that it would have such dire consistencies. That the big fight Ponyboy and Darry had would result in the death of their youngest brother. That that cold night would be the last night anything ever made sense, and that it would be the night that everything fell apart.

 **OoOoOoO**

Mechanically, Darry threw his dirty, muddy construction boots on the porch outside and walked inside of his lonely house.

So much had changed...

" _Stop treating me like I'm a kid, Darry. I'm seventeen years old, you can't keep treating me like this. I'm almost an adult."_

Darry never seemed to get an escape from the voice that plague him. Sometimes, he wondered if he was going insane, because only insane people hear voices.

The front door slammed shut, signaling someone's arrival or departure, and Darry was shocked to find that it was Sodapop coming through the front door.

"Hey, little buddy," came Darry's dead sounding hello.

Soda nodded a simple greeting back, throwing his jacket over the arm of the worn-out, lumpy chair and heading towards the kitchen silently. He didn't say anything and Darry was glad for that, but he couldn't ignore the emptiness in the house with only two members living inside of it's walls. That was of course not counting the gang's remaining members, who used to frequently stay over, but their visits had become less and less frequent. No one could stand the elephant in the room.

"Are you fixing dinner, Sodapop?"

"Yeah," he hollered back. "Mac 'n Cheese sound good?"

"Good enough," Darry yelled back to him, picking up the newspaper, but not reading it.

The house was quiet enough until Two-Bit came bounding through the front door, very buzzed, but not completely drunk yet. The booze was just beginning to hit him.

"Hello, boys," he grinned stupidly, throwing his hand up in a wave and flopping down onto the couch.

"Drunk again, Two-Bit?" Soda sales sarcastically, shaking his head. Two-Bit stared at the ceiling with precise speculation and curiosity, as if the answer to the universe was written up there.

"Maybe. We'll see."

"Dinner's ready, Superman," Sodapop stuck his head through the doorway between the living room and kitchen.

" _Darry! I made dinner for you," his voice floated into Darry's head, his face pleading for his older brother's approval._

 _Darry thought about how what he should've said, but instead he remembered his sickening response. "Look at this mess, Ponyboy!"_

 _"I'-I'll clean it up, Dar, I promise," he stuttered, slightly hurt and shocked by Darry's angry reaction, but he was trying not to show it._

Darry gulped. "I think that I'm gonna head to bed, Soda."

Again, Darry was leaving without dinner that my brother had slaved over for him, but he couldn't bring himself to stay in the living room any longer. If he did, he thought he just might burst.

Once in the privacy of his room, completely alone, Darry latched onto his pillow for it was the only stable thing he could find, and painfully, he watched as the rumble that was his life break into a million pieces. The pressure from it all buried him alive, while he wondered how he was going to pull himself out of this mess.

 **OoOoOoO**

Sodapop knew that Darry was breaking, but he didn't know how he was supposed to help.

He was supposed to be the glue that held his family together, but he could barely hold himself together every night when he went to bed by himself. And how was supposed to hold a family together that barely existed? Their family had shrunk from an innocent, happy five to a scarred and broken two.

They were lonely. Nothing hurt worse than the hole that was ripping apart their insides.

Sodapop continued to dream of the night he lost his brothers. One to death, one to guilt.

He finally knew how Ponyboy felt with his nightmares. It was torture having to relive all of the pain he was trying to escape during the day at night in his dreams.

Sodapop didn't know how much more he could take. He felt like his world was nothing; empty and colorless without his brother.

 **OoOoOoO**

" _I hate you, Darry," his voice was calmer than Darry's, hiding his anger in the heat of the moment, but his green eyes blazed._

 _"Just get out, Ponyboy! I can't even look at you right now!"_

 _I wished that you hadn't actually left,_ Darry thought sadly as he emerged from his bedroom quietly, so he didn't wake up Soda.

Soda didn't sleep in his room anymore. Too many memories and just too lonely, he had told Darry just after the incident. He wouldn't sleep in the other empty bedroom either, the one that Ponyboy had moved into just after he turned fifteen. Most of the time, Sodapop would just sleep on the couch.

 _My parent's death didn't shake me up this much, so why all of this now? Why am I not moving on?_ Darry wondered, feeling the familiar pang in the pit of his stomach.

 _Because you caused all of this!_ A malicious voice in Darry's head screamed, making his stomach churn uncomfortably. Too tired for breakfast, he trudged towards the bathroom to take a shower.

 **OoOoOoO**

As Sodapop laid on the couch that morning, with the house to himself, he unwillingly let a tear slip down his face as the memories of _'that night_ ' began to overtake his mind.

" _You_ _ain't ever thinking, are you, Ponyboy? If you don't start using that thick head of yours, you're gonna get sent to a boys home or get yourself killed!"_

 _"All I did was walk home from school. Stop treating me like I'm a kid, Darry. I'm seventeen years old, you can't keep treating me like this. I'm almost an adult," Ponyboy spit back, seething. Darry never seemed to get off his case._

 _"You're never happy with what I do. Well, guess what, Darry," Ponyboy screamed at Darry without letting the older man get a response in. "You're not my dad!"_

 _"You're being an ungrateful little brat," Steve butted in from the couch, not helping. Darry didn't even react to Steve's input as he yelled back._

 _"Maybe when you start acting like one I'll treat you like one! Steve's right; your acting like an immature, spoiled brat!"_

 _"I hate you, Darry," Ponyboy voice was suddenly calm, hiding his anger in the heat of the moment, but his green eyes blazed. "You don't even care about me. All you care about is Soda!"_

 _Sodapop didn't know how to react, so he numbly stood there. The boy who always mended the peace was out of words to fix the situation._

 _"If you feel that way, then just get out, Ponyboy! I can't even look at you right now! You disgust me."_

 _That was all Ponyboy needed to hear, he threw the door open and took off running at full speed._

 _Soda wanted to chase after the younger boy, but he figured Ponyboy just needed some time to cool off. Plus, Soda knew he wouldn't be able to catch up to the track star._

 _What he didn't know was that night, the youngest greaser took a step into the street as a car raced around the corner, unknown to the distracted boy. The car's drunken driver didn't have a chance to react as the car made contact with the young boy, sending his broken and bleeding body across the street where his heart stopped beating and the world of his brother's imploded._

And from that night on, the night the other shoe dropped, nothing was ever the same.

 **A/N: I hope that satisfied! Please review I love to know what you guys are thinking!**

 **Thank you guys so much for being patient with this. I am way over due for doing something with "Better Left Unspoken". I appreciate all the support!  
**

 **Stay Gold,**

 **\- Alee XxX**


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